


Arcana

by Shaish, Stringlish



Category: Captain America (Movies), The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: Bucky is a witch, F/M, Gen, M/M, Slow Burn, Witch Bucky, witch!bucky
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2015-10-31
Updated: 2015-10-31
Packaged: 2018-04-29 02:57:03
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,274
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5113562
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Shaish/pseuds/Shaish, https://archiveofourown.org/users/Stringlish/pseuds/Stringlish
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>
  <i>“Name?” the man asks, glasses slipping just a little lower down the bridge of his nose.</i>
</p><p>
  <i>“James Buchanan Barnes. Sergeant. 3255-”</i>
</p><p>
  <i>“No, wait-” the blonde one interrupts.</i>
</p><p>
  <i>He closes his mouth.</i>
</p><p>
  <i>Silence.</i>
</p><p>
  <i>A sigh.</i>
</p><p>
  <i>The lights flicker.</i>
</p>
            </blockquote>





	Arcana

**Author's Note:**

> Think of this as a preview? I wanted to post something for Halloween and this is probably the only thing that's going to make up it in time. It's just the first chapter and I'm probably going to try and finish everything else before I post more for this one, so if you want to see where it goes or if I post more before I actually finish everything else (likely), then bookmark/subscribe or whatever it is that lets you know about updates fdjksl. Happy Halloween/Samhain guys!
> 
> Rating may go up (it'll most likely go up who am I kidding? No one. Absolutely no one).
> 
> Thank you Kay for betaing. <333

“Name?” the man asks, glasses slipping just a little lower down the bridge of his nose.

“James Buchanan Barnes. Sergeant. 3255-”

“No, wait-” the blonde one interrupts.

He closes his mouth.

Silence.

A sigh.

“Let’s start with something a little less…” the man with the glasses trails off. Doctor Banner, he said his name was. Name. Names. “What’s the last thing that you remember?”

He stares down at the table, tracks the light refracting off of the barely there scratches in the surface.

“This room.”

A pause.

The blonde man shifts in his periphery.

“Before that?”

“Outside.”

“Do you-” the blonde man starts.

“Steve,” Doctor Banner cuts him off gently. The blonde man stills. Steve. Names. “Would you like to wait outside?”

“...No. I’m okay.”

“Let’s start again,” Doctor Banner decides, the feeling of eyes back on him. “What’s your name? As far as you know?”

He stares at the table, hands shifting just a bit and cuff jingling.

 

_“What is your name?”_

_“What- Augh!”_

_“What is your name?”_

_“I don- Augh!” “_

_What is your name?”_

_“I don’t remember!” he gets out just before his head whips round to the other side, pain stinging up the side of his face and eyes squeezing shut._

_“What is your name?”_

_“I don’t-” His words get cut off and his vision goes black when a bag gets pulled down over his head. Water splashes onto it, cold, and he sputters and gags, the wet material suction cupping to his face making it hard to breathe. He vaguely hears something spark and crackle and someone let out a curse._

_Curse?_

_“What is your name?”_

_Name?_

_“I…” he trails off, the scant light he can see through the bag blurring._

 

_Name…_

“I don’t remember,” he answers quietly, fingers twitching. One of the lights flicker and Doctor Banner’s head raises in his periphery.

“It’s alright,” Steve says, and his eyes shift up just a bit, just enough to see the star on his chest and his biceps. “It’s okay if you don’t remember.”

Is it? Is it.

Remember.

_Remember._

_Names._

The lights flicker.

-

“What do you think?” Steve asks, following him into the room.

“He’s not that kind of doctor,” Tony quips, throwing a smirk and a look their way. Doctor Banner gives him a dryly wry look back before returning his attention to Steve.

“I think, based on the scans Tony’s been able to get and interacting with him, that his mind is slowly trying to repair itself, but,” he adds, “That he’s still not all there, not…” He pulls up one of the brain scans from last night and gestures to the shifting light. “There’s a lot of activity still going on,” Bruce explains again, “His brain is still trying to sort out what he does and doesn’t know and remember. And that’s not including what he may or may not remember further down the line.” He looks back to Steve, eyes sympathetic, “We won’t know more until he does.”

Steve’s shoulders slump a little before he straightens them and nods, turning and getting into the elevator, doors sliding shut.

“You think he’ll remember?” Tony asks, elbows deep in the center of...something.

“I don’t know,” Bruce sighs, slanting a look at him with a quirk of his mouth, “I’m not that kind of doctor.”

Tony snorts quietly and turns back to his project.

\--

“Hey,” Steve says, walking in.

“Hey, man,” Sam greets back, looking over at him with a smile.

“How is he?” Steve asks, coming to a stop next to him at the viewing window, hand in his pocket.

“Same as when you left,” Sam replies, looking back into the room with him.

Bucky’s still sitting at the table in the center of the room, staring down at the surface.

“What did Doctor Banner have to say?” Sam asks after a minute.

“Same thing he said yesterday,” Steve sighs, pulling his hand out and leaning on them both on the edge of the window, “I thought maybe…” Sam reaches over and puts a hand on his shoulder and Steve blows out a breath.

“I know,” Sam replies, looking back into the room. The lights flicker again briefly. “Stark’s real annoyed he can’t figure out what’s causing that,” Sam says, looking up.

Steve’s lips twitch. He pulls his stool over and takes a seat, slipping his hand back into his pocket, thumb moving over the smooth surface of the thing inside.

“You sure about this?” Sam asks, and he looks over. “I’m just saying,” Sam continues, looking back, “He might not be the same person. Ever.” Steve looks back into the room.

“Doesn’t matter.”

“You sure?”

Steve lets out a slow breath, eyes on Bucky, or the Winter Soldier, _Bucky_. Bucky looks up, eyes briefly on them before they drop again, back to the table.

“How does he always know where to look?” Sam wonders, crossing his arms while his eyebrows draw together.

“Magic,” Steve replies, smiling small and wry. He stands and walks out of the room, stopping in front of the next room’s door and pressing his thumb to the fingerpad, stepping inside once the door slides open.

What he doesn’t know and that Sam doesn’t have the chance to tell him, is that Bucky’s eyes follow him the whole way to the door, lingering then dropping down to the table just before the door opens.

But Steve doesn’t need Sam to.

Steve slowly walks over to the table Bucky’s still sat at and takes the seat he’d been in earlier, watching Bucky’s body language, just in case. “I’m sorry about this,” he says.

Bucky’s- Bucky? He has to believe he’s Bucky in there, somewhere. Bucky’s eyes shift up as much as they had earlier, not enough to meet his own.

“You have to be sure,” is all he says, voice a little rough and quiet.

 _Not me_ , Steve wants to say, even though Nat’s tried to warn him.

“I have something for you,” he says after a minute, and Bucky stills, more than he had been earlier. His eyes rise up a bit further before dropping back down to the star on his chest, or at least, that’s what Steve’s pretty sure his eyes are resting on. He reaches into his pocket and pulls the stone out, gently setting it a little closer towards Bucky’s half of the table and watching him closely.

Bucky stares at it for a long minute before reaching forward-

He stops, fingers curling in a little and eyes shifting up slightly, before looking back down at it and reaching forward the rest of the way, gently taking it and holding it in front of him. Steve wants to say it was his, wants to ask him if he remembers, but he already got a lecture from both Natasha _and_ Doctor Banner, so he keeps his lips firmly together and waits.

Bucky stares at it for- Steve’s not sure how long, before eventually, carefully setting it down on the table in front of himself. “It matches your eyes,” he says quietly, and Steve relaxes minutely, wasn't even aware he'd been tense.

“Yeah,” he replies, soft and quiet, trying to keep the smile off of his face. He compromises with a small one. “Yeah, it does.” Bucky keeps his eyes on the stone.

There's a soft knock on the door and Steve gets up, leaves a part of himself in the room when he goes. Bucky’s eyes dart up to it after he's gone, then drop back to the stone.

He stares at it, long and hard, and the lights flicker then go out when it slowly rises from the table.


End file.
